The Avocado by Terrance Hayes

The Avocado

 

“In 1971, drunk on the sweet, sweet juice of revolution, 

a crew of us marched into the president’s office with a list 

of demands,” the black man tells us at the February luncheon, 

and I’m pretending I haven’t heard this one before as I eye 

black tortillas on a red plate beside a big green bowl 

of guacamole made from the whipped, battered remains 

of several harmless former avocados. If abolitionists had a flag 

it would no doubt feature the avocado, also known as the alligator 

pear, for obvious reasons. “Number one: reparations! 

Enough gold to fill each of our women’s wombs, gold 

to nurse our warriors waiting to enter this world with bright fists, 

that’s what we told them,” the man says, and I’m thinking 

of the money-colored flesh of the avocado, high in monosaturates; 

its oil content is second only to olives. I am looking 

at Yoyo’s caterpillar locks dangle over her ear. I dare you 

to find a lovelier black woman from Cincinnati, where the North 

touches the South. “Three: we wanted more boulevards 

named for the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. An airport 

named for Sojourner Truth.” The roots of the avocado tree

can raise pavement, so it’s not too crazy to imagine the fruit 

as a symbol of revolt on the abolitionist flag. We are all one kind 

of abolitionist or another, no doubt. And we are like the avocado too 

with its inedible ruby-colored seed that can actually sprout from inside 

when the fruit is overmature, causing internal molds and breakdown. 

“Demand number twenty-one: a Harriet Tubman statue on the mall!” 

Brother man is weeping now and walking wet tissue to the trash can 

and saying, “Harriet Tubman was a walking shadow,” or, “Harriet Tubman 

walked in shadows,” or, “To many, Harriet Tubman was a shadow

to walk in,” and the meaning is pureed flesh with lime juice, 

minced garlic, and chili powder; it is salt, and the pepper 

Harriet Tubman tossed over her shoulder to trouble the bloodhounds. 

Many isolated avocado trees fail to fruit from lack of pollination. 

“Goddamn, ain’t you hungry?” I whisper to Yoyo, and she puts a finger 

to my lips to distract me. Say, baby, wasn’t that you waking me up 

last night to say you’d had a dream where I was a big luscious mansize 

avocado? Someone’s belly is growling. “We weren’t going 

to be colored, we weren’t going to be Negro,” the man says, 

and I’m thinking every time I hear this story it’s the one telling the story 

that’s the hero. “Hush now,” Harriet Tubman probably said 

near dawn, pointing a finger black enough to be her pistol barrel 

toward the future or pointing a pistol barrel black enough 

to be her finger at the mouth of some starved, stammering slave 

and then lifting her head to listen for something no one but her could hear.